So I actually updated.

I'm a cruel, cruel person, and probably no one will even read this because I was so mean and didn't update for AGES

But if you do, I hope you enjoy it. I'm undecided on it :P

As ever, pleaseeeee review!

Xx M xX

Chapter 7

Riley POV

It had been an inconclusive conversation.

To be honest, I didn't even have the energy to think about it. Since coming of the human blood, I had felt exhausted permanently, and it scared me knowing that if I got into a fight now, I might just lose it. For the first time since becoming a vampire, I felt weak.

I stood up, jumping from the second floor window and landing on the ground with barely a sound. Since Edward's sudden powerlessness, I didn't particularly want to come in to contact with any of the Cullens, who would no doubt start asking questions that I really didn't want to answer. A part of me wanted to just leave – what if I lost this… blocking ability, and Edward could read my mind again – I'd be well and truly screwed.

Once upon a time it would have taken me half an hour to drive to Seattle from Forks, but since becoming what I was I could run there in a few minutes. No that it was ever a problem before, since I lived there, but the speed wasn't something I regretted about being a vampire.

I wasn't sure what it was about the events of the last few hours that made me decide to go back, but it suddenly seemed like a preferable option to staying in Forks – at least now I'd be able to get some sort of closure.

I stopped at the end of my street, bending down and picking up a scrap of paper from the floor. It was so wet that it was thin and translucent, and almost fell apart in my hand, but I could still see half of the word "missing" and the corner of a photo I recognised from our mantelpiece. I'd seen the posters before, but never before in a position when I actually cared about them, when it made the breath hitch in my throat.

It was a strange thing, I thought, as I walked slowly down the road. Strange that almost all of the vampires I had ever known continued breathing, despite it not being necessary. Perhaps it was something to do with clinging onto any humanity you had left.

I stopped outside their house, and noticed absentmindedly that I had started to rain.

Yet another thing that changed when you became a vampire; you were suddenly so solid that you could barely feel the rain against your skin anymore.

I couldn't be sure how long I stood there. It could have been minutes, or it could have been hours. In my new state, time was much less linear – hours could last seconds, and minutes days.

The house that I was waiting outside wasn't the house that I had grown up in. I'd burnt that one to the ground. But luckily they hadn't move far, a few houses down in the same street, and my new found sense of smell told me exactly where to go.

Unsure whether the Cullens would agree with me spilling our secret to humans, I felt almost guilty as I opened the gate quietly and made my way down to the front door. They'd told Bella, after all, but apart from that I was pretty sure no humans knew about them. Oh well, I thought darkly to myself, this is my problem, not theirs.

I remembered when I'd tried to call my mom, soon after I'd gone back to the Cullens'. Would this be a similar incident? Would I freak and bolt at the last minute.

Would they notice, at first, that I hadn't aged in the last few months?

I swallowed.

There were a few seconds before my mom answered my knock on the door, a few seconds in which the idea of running seemed like the best thing in the world.

But I stayed, and then she saw me.

'Oh my God, Riley,' she threw her arms around me, and I tried to ignore the pounding of blood in her neck. It was almost a dizzying sensation being close to her like that, just as it was when I was near Bella. I'd never felt like that near humans before, at least not that I could remember. I supposed that someone starving to death would feel the same way about food.

'Where have you been?' There were tears in her eyes.

I was glad that the traditional rule of having to be invited in wasn't true in reality, because I wanted to be well over the threshold and in the living room before I started telling her where I had been.

'It's a long story,' I had to bite my lip to stop tears from rising to my own eyes.

'I should call your father… and the police and… and… where have you been, Riley?'

'Mom you can't call the police,' I looked around the house, taking in the photos of myself on the mantelpiece. 'You just have to promise me that you won't call the police.'

She looked aghast, clearly thinking that I had become embroiled in some sort of gang culture, and that I was a criminal or a fugitive. The truth, I couldn't help but feel, was much, much worse.

She started to cry even more when I told her, and then she said the one thing that I hadn't expected, hadn't even considered. 'Get out!'

'What?'

She held out the crucifix from around her neck as though it would repel me. 'You're not my son!'

'Yes I am mom, I'm exactly the same! I'm still Riley!'

'Riley would never have killed all those people. No, I've heard enough about your kind, you're a soulless demon and nothing else, and you've taken my son away from me, so get out!'

'Mom!' I shouted, 'it's me!'

'Just… just please,' she shook her head, 'just leave. I don't want your – I don't want Riley's father to have to see you like this. He's better off thinking you're dead!'

'What?' I had never felt so utterly destroyed. This was the moment that I had been planning for so long, and it was crashing and burning. It was supposed to be like one of those reunions you see on TV, but instead it was the worst time of my life.

I didn't bother to argue anymore, I just ran. Just like I should have done earlier. I should've known that she would react like this – a devout Catholic like her would never be able to accept me like this. And why should she? She was right, I wasn't the Riley I was before.

I went to the first place that came into my head – one of Victoria's old haunts.

I leant heavily against the wall of the back alley, trying to pretend that the last hour hadn't happened. The problem with being a vampire was that you couldn't wake up from any nightmares – everything was completely real.

'You alright there?' A police officer peered down the alley at me.

'I'm fine,' I turned around with a smile, and even from such a long distance I could hear the blood moving sluggishly around his body. I wondered whether I should warn him that he had a weak heart. I also wondered whether I should grab him before anyone would see, rip his throat out, and turn into the monster that I had been a month ago. 'I'm fine,' I repeated, and he shrugged and strolled away.

The worst thing about it was that if I had killed him, he'd have just been another person to add to the body count of this alleyway. It had been a prime spot for killing – not changing, just feeding.

I killed the wall, and the bricks crunched under the impact, making the building itself groan ominously. Swearing, I stepped away from it, reminding myself that things as simple as touching something could end in disaster.

Sighing heavily, I pulled out my phone and tapped in Bella's number.

'Riley,' she sounded like she was smiling.

'Hey, Bella,' I made my way out of the alleyway and back onto the street, trying not to breathe and let in the smell of the people I kept bumping in to. 'Are you at home?'

'Yeah, Charlie just went out fishing with some friends. Did you want to come over? I suppose it might be a good idea to talk about what happened… y'know, in person.'

'I was just gonna ask if I could come over anyway,' I broke into a run once I was back in a side street. Glad that my sense of direction had improved since becoming a vampire, and that finding my way back to Forks would be easy.

'It probably is best.'

'This day has kind of gone downhill,' I said slowly – understatement.

'Riley, what's happened?'

'I don't really want to talk about it,' and then I sighed, 'I went to see my mom.'

'Oh my God,' I could imagine her face gaping down the phone. 'What did she say?'

'She freaked, chased me out of the house with a crucifix, told me never to come back. It was good times, honestly.'

'Oh Riley I'm so sorry,' she was the first person ever to say that to me and actually sound genuine, and not like she was talking to a very slow child.

'I'm fine,' I lied, 'look, I'll be back in Forks soon and I don't want to spoil the whole story, so I'll see you in a minute, yeah?'

'Riley you don't have to - ' but I'd already hung up.

There you have it, a nice, shiny new update.

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